He Died Well
by mooseman222
Summary: Lan's new tradition is carried on. [AMoL spoilers]
1. Introduction

Mat sat alone in his tent, staring up at the ceiling from his bed. He'd barely moved in hours. It was likely the shock of it that kept him there. He hadn't expected to go back to living a 'normal' life after the Last Battle for nearly two years now, but he'd certainly expected it to have some sort of normalcy. But without him there, it would be drastically different.

All in all, the battle had gone well; he knew that. He was a good enough tactician to know that considering the odds they'd faced, they'd come out far ahead of what could be reasonably expected of the Light's forces. But there had been one loss that had struck him harder than any other, than any ten, or twenty, or even a hundred.

The Dragon Reborn, Car'a'carn, Coramoor, was dead.

The King of Illian was dead.

And most of all, Rand al'Thor, Mat's oldest and closest friend, was dead.

He and Perrin had gotten together after the battle to talk. Despite their intentions, though, they hadn't talked much. Mostly, they'd just sat in silence, a lot like he was doing now. There would be a lot of that going on.

Neither of them had said anything at his pyre, either. No one had, not Min, or Elayne, or Aviendha. Not even Tam. They'd all just stood there in silence and watched what was left of his friend burn.

He should be happy, if anything. Even Nynaeve hadn't been able to save him, and if she couldn't do it, no one could have. No doubt he'd been in extreme pain before he'd died. That didn't make Mat feel any better, though.

The flap of the tent opened, and Mat turned his head to see. When he'd heard the noise, he had assumed it was Tuon, but instead, an enormous figure stood in the faint light of the fire, one hand holding up the cloth of the tent and the other resting on the sword on his hip. "Get up," al'Lan Mandragoran rumbled. "We have something to do."

"Blood and ashes, Lan," he groaned, shutting his eyes tight and covering his face with his hat. "Can't you people leave me alone for one night?"

The hat was pulled out of his fingers quickly. "No," the Warder said, his voice firm. "Get up," he said again."

With a sigh, Mat did as he was told, pulling a green coat over his shoulders. He jerked the hat out of Lan's gigantic hand and flopped it onto his head.

"Take it," Lan said, offering him the _ashandarei _that had been leaning against the bed moments before. "There will be Borderlanders there."

"So?"

"So no Borderlander can respect a man who leaves his weapon in his tent, this close to the Blight. Not even after the enemy has been defeated."

"You're all bloody mad," Mat grumbled, taking the black-shafted weapon from Lan's hands. It felt good under his fingers, like it was in the right place again, considering how long he'd held it today. He might even have birds carved into his hands by this point.

_ Like Rand, _he thought. He grimaced. "So where are we going?"

"To the blacksmith's tent, first," Lan said. "Then to the fire. We have a tradition to uphold."

"Is this about... him?" Mat asked, looking up at the Malkieri man with a cocked eyebrow.

"Of course it is," he said. "For a little while, at least, everything will be about him."

Mat only nodded, and followed closely behind the Warder with his weapon across his shoulders. Even now, Lan walked with caution in his step, like he was expecting something to spring from the shadows. _That's no king's walk, _Mat thought. _His back needs to be straighter. More like Thorin._ It took him a moment to remember that he didn't know who Thorin al Toren al Ban was.

Lan disappeared into Perrin's tent and reappeared within the minute, Perrin close behind him. Perrin only nodded when he caught sight of Mat. He didn't look well, his beard scraggly and his eery yellow-gold eyes empty.

"Haven't slept, have you?" Mat asked. Perrin shook his head.

"You?"

"No."

Lan set off again, towards the center of the camp, where the Peace had been signed only days ago. He stopped at one of the fire pits near the pyre. "Sit down."

They did as he said, lowering themselves onto the wooden log stools around the pit and feeling much like the boys they'd been when they'd left the Rivers two years ago.

Lan handed them a wineskin. "Drink," he ordered. Once again, they did as they were told. "The others will be here soon."

"What others?" Mat asked.

"The ones that knew him best, among we who remain."

That seemed to shoot a lance of fire into Mat's heart as he thought of Egwene. _Light, we knew he might die, but I never would have guessed _she _would, too. _

Lan was right. They were not alone for very long. Several soldiers and Asha'man joined them, but Mat was sure they weren't the people Lan intended them to meet. The first to arrive was a tall man, white-haired and moustached, with a patched cloak around his shoulders. The gleeman sat down next to Mat and took the wine from his hand, drawing deep from it. "I hope you have more of this, Lan," he said. "We're going to need it."

Lan nodded towards the supply tent not far away. "I've told them to bring over more bottles when it gets too quiet here."

Thom nodded, too, gazing at the fire. "Exquisite is a good word, I think," he said simply. "But not quite enough."

"What in the Light are you talking about?" Mat asked.

"Never mind."

An Arafellin man, the same age as Mat and Perrin, with braided black hair and equally dark eyes, sat down next to Lan. From the pins on his collar, Mat guessed he was one of Rand's Asha'man. The surprising thing about him, though, was the glass sword he wore on his belt- Callandor itself. He touched it constantly, as if trying to remind himself it was actually there.

The next was a figure so large it made even Lan seem small, with wide shoulders and big ears. "Good evening, Mat," Loial said quietly. He looked almost lost, saying nothing more, as he sat down.

"Is that everyone?" Perrin asked.

Lan shook his head. "One more."

Tam arrived soon after. If Loial had seemed lost, then Tam was so far into the depths of his misery that Mat couldn't be sure he would ever find his way out again. He sat on Perrin's right. "Why did you call us here, Mandragoran?" he asked. There was a gruff sound to his voice, and his eyes were red.

Lan nodded to him, and Thom handed over the skin. "Drink, first," the king said. "Then, we will talk." He did, lifting the bladder into the air and drank until it was empty. Then, Lan took up one of the bottles of wine sitting next to his log by the neck and passed it along, followed by the next, until each man had a bottle. He raised his into the air and said, simply, "He died well."

Mat was sure the echo could be heard for miles around.


	2. The Prince of Ravens

"Do you know about the tradition, Matrim?" Lan asked, taking a swig from his bottle. Mat shook his head. "At the end of a battle, we gather around the fire pit, and we tell tales of the brothers we lost. It brings us closure, and it lets us let them go." He took another drink. "And now we honor the sheepherder."

Thom laughed. "Still calling him that, eh?"

Lan smiled wolfishly. "When he was alive, I called him sheepherder to remind him of where he came from. Now, though, it is an empty gesture." His smile faded. "He was a good learner."

For a moment, there was silence around the fire pit as the men thought. Then, Mat spoke up. "I'll start." He lifted his hat an inch of his head and scratched his scalp as he composed himself. "Not long before Winternight," he began.

"Not long before Winternight, Rand and I agreed to visit Taren Ferry, to see if the stories were true, whether they were all bloody bastards and swindlers. It was my idea, of course. I don't think he cared one way or the other, but he came along, like he always did. That was his job, in his mind. To keep me out of trouble. It didn't work very well, usually, and I ended up getting him in trouble more often than he kept me out of it, but he tried anyway." Mat grimaced. "And doesn't that just explain everything," he said with a grin.

"So we took the road down to Taren Ferry. It's a big town, bigger than Emond's Field, but not as big as Baerlon. We still felt like we were in the right place." He laughed. "That didn't last long."

"At first, we were just trying to test if what Master al'Vere and Nynaeve had always said, that the Taren Ferryers were like a bunch of Aes Sedai. Ashes, that would be awful, wouldn't it? A whole town of Aes Sedai, and lying Aes Sedai, too."

"Watch your mouth, boy," Thom said, knuckling his moustaches with a smile. "I'm married to one of those now, you know."

"You know Moiraine's as tricky as the rest of them," Mat said, brow furrowed.

Thom laughed. "Light, if that's not true. If there's any woman you need to watch your mouth around, it's her." That drew a laugh even from Lan, coming in deep, rolling waves.

"My point is, to hear the mayor talk, it's like the lot of them were Darkfriends. But I've never been one to believe someone at their word-"

"Except for that time Rand convinced you that Farmer al'Darney's daughter wanted to kiss you," Perrin interjected.

"You be quiet," Mat said with a scowl. "That wasn't my fault. Friends aren't supposed to trick each other."

"Except for that time you tried to convince Rand that Egwene was trapped down the well," Perrin said, eyes twinkled.

"_As I was saying, _I've never been one to take people at their word. So we went to see. We'd gotten some money from our fathers, for little trinkets and such, and we watched carefully for pickpockets, or swindlers, or cheapskates. And we got duped a few times, but no more often than we would have if Fain-" He paused. For an instant, no more, his hand twitched, yearning for the dagger's comforting hilt. "Than we would have if Fain had been coming through town," he concluded. "So thought that maybe they weren't so bad. Light, we were wrong."

"You weren't _wrong,_" Perrin said. "You just-"

"We were wrong!" Mat yelled. "Now if you'd just let me finish, Perrin!"

Perrin shrugged and smiled.

"We had to stay the night in the town. It was too long a walk to get there and back to the farms in one day, if we included all the time we'd spent actually there. We rented a room in the inn, and we went to mingle with the Ferryers. Rand and I didn't have much trouble getting along with them, and within the hour, we were drinking and singing and talking, all the usual sort of thing you do when you're in a strange place.

"Now, Rand stayed and talked a while longer while I took a walk along the Tarendrelle to clear my head."

"To chase after the girls, he means," Perrin said with a smile."

"Quiet!" Mat snarled, a finger pointed at his friend. He stopped the story for a moment more to take a drink from his bottle, then continued. "Along the river, I met a girl named Niena. A fine girl, a bit plump in just the right places, and cheery, too. She liked me, obviously, so I took her back to-" He blushed. "I took her back to her father's barn."

Thom cackled. "To her father's barn? Light, you act like you're not some naive farm boy, but you are, aren't you?" He laughed again, taking a drink to drown out his mirth. "Light, her father's barn."

"It's like a gleeman's story," Loial rumbled.

"Yes, Thom, her father's barn!" Mat said. He scowled. "So I took her back to _her father's barn, _and we got to- well, we got to doing what boys from out of town and farmer's daughters do, and all that."

Lan snorted.

"Oh, shut up! I'm sure you had your silly little fancies when you were a boy, Lan."

"My _carneira _tried to marry me off to her daughter," the Malkieri said.

Mat blinked. "See?" he said once he'd recovered. "That was silly. And so was Niena. The problem with Niena, though, wasn't that she was silly. Niena's problem was that she was the mayor's daughter, and that she was a little daft. See, she'd forgotten that her father _wasn't _in town that night. He was in the farmhouse, and he heard a bit of the ruckus we made. So he came out to the barn, likely thinking he was going to have to chase a stray dog away from his cattle, but instead he found... us. Or more importantly, me." Mat's cheeks flushed red very quickly, and Thom laughed at him. "Burn you!" he exclaimed. "So Niena's father chased me away. But he didn't stop once I was off his property. He chased me into town, got the town all roiled up, and had half of the townsfolk chasing after me, too. So I ran for the inn, to get Rand and get out, and burst through the tavern door, coat half-on and trousers not quite done up. I remember what he said to me- he said, 'Burn you, Mat, can't you keep your blasted hands to yourself for one night?' I don't think I'd ever heard Rand swear like that, not once in my life, and I don't think I have since- not when we saw the first of the Light-forsaken Forsaken, not when we attacked Caemlynn-" Mat blinked, as if trying to recall something that was missing. "And not even when he tried to send us away." He held his breath for a moment, trying to think of what to say next.

"But he left his drink, and he left his new-found friends, who were no doubt ready to boil over once they heard what I'd done- apparently Niena was like the whole town's darling, or else I have no idea how he made the whole of Taren Ferry hate me so much.

"And he ran along the road with me, yelling and swearing and cursing at me the whole time, but he never stopped running, and he never even suggested stopping and letting Niena's father have his go at me. He even offered to try to talk to him for me- he's always been better at that sort of thing. Their fathers have always hated me, but old Bran's loved Rand since he was a little boy.

"We had to camp in the middle of the West Wood in the middle of the night, without a tent and without a fire for fear the Ferryers would see it and catch us. He grumbled about it a little, but he stayed with me through the night, and when morning came, we trudged back to Emond's Field with out Taren Ferry trinkets in our bags, and he didn't breath a word of what happened to my father, or his." He shivered. "Or Light forbid, to Nynaeve."

Lan laughed, and Perrin joined in, seemingly taking the Warder king's own laughter as permission to laugh.

Mat smiled. "Light," he muttered. "He was the best friend I ever had. No offence, Perrin."

"It's hard to compete with the Dragon Reborn," Perrin said.

Mat nodded, and his eyes wandered towards the pyre. "It is," he said. "Light burn me, it is." Then he took another drink, and said, "He died well."

The others echoed his toast and took drinks of their own.


	3. The Wolf King

Perrin nodded slowly. "You're right, Mat," he said. "He was always the sort to take responsibility for things, even if he could get away from it." He smiled. "Unlike someone," he added, raising an eyebrow in Mat's direction.

Loial laughed. "Perrin, why don't you continue?" the Ogier asked. He held an open book in his hands, and was scribbling in it furiously.

"Fine," he said. "But why don't you give it a rest, at least for tonight? These stories will be no less fresh tomorrow night."

The Ogier's quill stopped moving for a moment, and then he set it and the book aside. Gingerly, he picked up the glass bottle between his thumb and forefinger, bringing it up to his lips for an instant and draining it just as quick. His massive body didn't even sway when he put the empty bottle away.

Perrin smiled. "Like a thimble," he said. "I suppose if anyone's qualified to talk about Rand, it's me and Mat. And- well, and you, Tam," he said, nodding respectfully in the old soldier's direction. He frowned when he saw the look in his eye, though he seemed a little less pale than he had before Mat's story.

"A few years ago, Rand knocked on my door early in the morning, just after sunrise. 'One's missing,' he told me. He looked so worried. I asked him what was missing. 'One of the sheep,' he said. He started looking around, like he thought it might have gone around behind him and he'd just missed it. 'Please, Perrin,' he said. 'Help me find it.' So I went out with him, and we tried to find the sheep.

"It took us hours. The whole time, I was wondering why he was trying so hard. He was a sheepherder, he knew that sometimes the wolves get them- not that I blame them," he said. His eyes took a dangerous gleam then, but it faded just as quickly. "He knew that sometimes, they just wander off."

"I've lost many an animal to the West Wood," Tam confirmed, a small smile on his square face.

"He didn't stop. We were wandering the forest, going around in circles again and again. I don't think he wanted me there so much to help him look as to keep him company, and I'm sure he asked me to make sure I didn't spend the whole time moaning and complaining." He smiled and glanced over at Mat.

"Hey," he said, an offended look on his face.

"Oh, don't pretend you wouldn't have," Perrin said.

"I don't think you stopped complaining the entire time it took to get to the Eye," Lan said.

"I did not!" Mat said.

"You did," Thom said. "Not only did you complain, but you complained _loudly, _too. It's a miracle any one of us got any sleep. I fought a Halfman just to get away from the blasted noise of it."

"You fought a Halfman?" the Asha'man said, mouth agape. "_You?_ But- you're not a Borderlander, not a channeler, not even a _swordsman, _how in the Light did you-"

"A performer never gives away his best tricks, boy," the gleeman said with a wry look in his eye. He seemed to produce a knife from nowhere, roll it across his knuckles, and send it back down his sleeve in a second. "Keep going, Perrin."

The Wolfbrother nodded. "We went around in circles, going over the same paths and looking in the same bushes all day long. Then, finally, I asked him what was so important about this sheep. I thought maybe it was his favorite, or the youngest, maybe, or one he'd helped birth himself. But do you know what he said to me?" He stopped for a moment, waiting for an answer.

"He sat down next to me on a rock in the middle of the forest, buried his head in his hands, and said 'Nothing.'

"At first, I was livid. We'd spent all day trying to find one sheep, one lost little lamb in the forest, tripping over roots and rocks and bruising our knees and cutting our knuckles, and for what reason? No reason at all, really. He'd lost one of his flock, and to him, that was unacceptable. He'd failed to protect them, so he needed to correct his mistake.

"It wasn't easy finding the sheep, but we did it anyways. In the end, we found the little guy with a broken leg crouched in the brush, hiding from wolves, or a bear, or whatever it thought was after it. When Rand found it, he was so happy, he slung the little thing over those Aiel shoulders of his and smiled like a fool, laughing and grinning the whole way home."

"It was one of the best days I ever spent with him, and it might have been the day he _earned _my respect. Before, he'd had it, the way your friends do just because you've known them for years, but when I saw the depths he'd go to to fulfil his responsibility, I realized the kind of man he was."

He closed his mouth, fearing his voice would falter in its step if he continued, and collected himself. "The kind of man that would do absolutely anything to protect the people in his care."

Silence fell.

"Light, he did all that for one lamb?" Tam asked with pain in his voice. "Light."

Perrin looked up to see Rand's father holding his head in one hand. He looked up to see Perrin staring at him, but looked away quickly.

Maybe he hoped to avoid Perrin seeing him cry. It didn't work, if that's what he was aiming for.

After an uncomfortable moment, Thom spoke up. "Drink up, lads," the white-haired gleeman said. "Or else the lads in the supply tent will start bringing out the heavy stuff, and I don't know about you all, but I have a ballad to write in the morning, and I don't want it to be about my raging headache." He smiled, empty but reassuring, and raised his bottle into the air.

"I can drink to that," Narishma said. "If to nothing else."

"I'm going to need a new bottle," Loial said sheepishly as he peered into the empty red-purple bottle.

"Light, Stonemason," Lan said, passing the last of them over to Loial's spot as the Ogier dropped his empty bottle into the pile sitting next to him with a _clink. _"You're going to drink the camp dry if you keep up this pace."

"It's not my fault I need a drink after today," he said. "So much death." He shivered. "Light, I hope I never have to see something like that ever again."

"You won't," Perrin said confidently. "He saw to that. That's what he did. He saw to things." He smiled, his eyes hazing over as he lost himself to his memories. "And he died well."

"Damn right, he did," Narishma said.

"He died well," they all said. And then they drank.


	4. The Gleeman

Thom watched each of the attendees carefully. Each crowd was different. They all wanted different things, whether they knew it or not, expected different things from a story or a party trick. Even after decades of storytelling, he would be willing to bet that he'd never told the same story exactly the same way twice, from Hawkwing's conquests to the tales of the Breaking.

Of course, this crowd was different from any other he'd ever been in front of. For one thing, he wasn't really in front of it. He was just as much a part of it as young Mat or Perrin were. How would that affect how the story was told? More camaraderie, of course; these were his brothers in mourning the boy. More reverence? They were here as much to honour Rand as the Dragon as they were to honour him as a man. The Arafellin had probably never used Rand's name with him in the entirety of their time together. Mat and Perrin were different, of course, not to mention Tam... but reverence might do it, too.

He shook his head. This was no ballroom full of nobility with air in their heads. These were men, real and true, and veterans, too; every one of them. He had no place turning such a solemn memorial of Rand's life into a show.

That meant telling it in _Common Chant. _

Light.

He took a deep breath. "He was a good man," he said. "Probably a better man than he was a ruler, but he wasn't bad at that, either." He laughed. "Not _too _bad, at least. The Tairens might disagree with me on the quality of his rule."

Narishma cocked an eyebrow. He was grinning. Thom knew that Rand had been smart to pick that one.

"And that's the crux of it. He was a good man. Solid, dependable, like a steel bar. And just as inflexible." He smiled wistfully. "And Light, he was only, what, twenty-one?"

Tam nodded. "Only twenty-one."

"The poor fool," Thom said. "He didn't deserve what he got. When I met him, he was just another damn farm boy, out in the world for the first time. I remember the look on his face when he saw _Baerlon, _for Light's sake. I could barely stretch my arms out in a city that small, and he was looking at it like it was Tar Valon.

"The earliest real memory I have of him was after we all got separated at Shadar Logoth," Thom said.

"Shadar Logoth?" Narishma said, deep brown eyes wide as saucers. "You took him to Shadar Logoth?"

Lan snorted. "The gleeman didn't take us into Aridhol," he said. "His Light-forsaken wife did."

Thom laughed. "Careful," he said. "She's got better ears than a bat. Even I don't know how far away she could hear us talking, but I have no doubt she's listening in."

"If I was afraid of what Moiraine would do to me," Lan said. "I would have stopped talking altogether years ago."

Mat looked at the Warder carefully. "You gave me my medallion back, right?"

"You know it only counts as daring when you stand up to an Aes Sedai if they _can _wrap you up in weaves of Air, right?" Perrin said.

Mat frowned. "That's a lie. Their words are scarier than their weaves."

Thom laughed. "Mat, that was very nearly witty. Keep at it and some day you might charm a woman instead of having to wrap one up in a carpet and smuggle her out of a palace."

"That's not how it happened!"

"All right, boy. Now as I was saying, my first memory with Rand wasn't long after we'd caught up after Shadar Logoth, just before Whitebridge. I'd spent half the day trying to teach the two of you how to play anything more than the simplest notes, Mat, and you'd progressed to the point that you no longer sounded like a duck falling off a galloping horse. You weren't quite at the point of actual _music _yet, though, so I'm not sure I can really give you any credit." Mat frowned, and Perrin slapped him on the shoulder. "I'd finally given up on the two of you and went off to the room to get some sleep while the two of you tried your best to charm those two girls."

Mat boggled. "That never happened!"

"All right," Thom said, shrugging. "You're right, it didn't. That girl, Lirnin, definitely _didn't _reject you like an unripe melon and she most certainly didn't throw her drink in your face when you tried to pinch her bottom."

"None of that happened!" Mat said, apparently choosing to focus his protests solely on Perrin. "That never happened!" He was blushing, then, red as an Aielman's head.

"I lay in bed for a while, listening to the bustle of the inn below me. I heard it quiet down steadily, and at some point, you stumbled in, clothes half-off and smelling of ale..."

"I was not!"

"Pick your battles, Matrim," Tam said with a small smile on his face.

"You fell into bed and started snoring so loud it kept me up. After a few minutes, I got up out of my bed and went to get my flute. I quickly found it wasn't there, and I began to worry. Had someone stolen it? It was worth a fair bit. Light, it had been a gift from Morgase. No doubt worth a hefty price in any market I've ever been to, all fine silver.

"I stepped downstairs to look for a thief, and instead found a giant of a boy fumbling with it alone in the corner. The inn had cleared out by that point entirely, and he was sitting in almost total darkness, save for the light of the full moon." In truth, it had been a crescent moon, and he'd had a lantern, but that didn't quite paint the same picture, and what was the harm?

"'Rand?' I said quietly. He looked up so fast and locked his eyes on me like a spooked stag.

"'I'm sorry,' he muttered. 'I was just trying to see if I could play something I heard Egwene's father sing once, and I-' I had to stop him there. He had gone completely red, clearly terrified I'd caught him. Light, he was still just a boy, new to the world."

"So much can change in only a few years," Tam said with a strange look in his eye.

Thom winced. He had heard about the reception Rand had given him when they'd met again in the Stone. That left a mark in a man's heart, even if Rand had more than made up for it later.

He coughed. "Yes," he said simply. "Yes, it can. The poor boy was so frightened I thought he might have spoiled his pants." Mat laughed, but quieted as soon as he realized he was the only one who had. Thom cocked an eyebrow in his direction and continued. "I asked him why he wanted to play it, and he reddened even more. He explained that Egwene had said it was one of her favorite songs, and he was hoping he might be able to play it for her when they met up again.

"I don't know if he ever did. From what I've been told, they only met up again in Caemlynn, and from there it was nothing but a sea of troubles.

"It was a simple song, though, even if he couldn't play it, beginner that he was. To his credit, he wasn't bad with his fingers, though. No pickpocket, for sure, but good nonetheless. We must have spent hours trying to work that piece out of him, and I managed to get it down on paper for him and teach him some basic music theory to help him. I knew the song, though not by the name he knew it. That made it easier for the both of us.

"Even after I got too tired to go on and went up to bed, he kept to it. I heard the finished version a few days later. He made sure to tell me he'd gotten through it after Mat had gotten to bed, of course, and it was a little rough around the edges, but it was good nonetheless. He looked so happy when I said it was good.

"I made a vulgar little crack about trying to impress Egwene with it, but what he said to me after showed me why this little song, nothing more than a little lullaby, was so important to him.

"He said to me, 'It's not that, Thom. I've just seen the way she's been since we left. With Mat and Perrin and me, leaving home is one big adventure. No boy born in the Two Rivers wants to stay there his whole life. We want to go out, see everything, even if we eventually come home again. But Egwene... she doesn't want to be some soldier's wife, or a camp follower, or anything like that. She likes who she is. She's Nynaeve's apprentice, and she'll be the Wisdom after she dies. She only came to make sure we stayed safe. I just want to make her feel a little more at home, that's all.'" Thom smiled and noted that Tam had swelled a little, with pride most likely. "I didn't have anything to say about that. I've played my fair share of songs for my fair share of women, but it was certainly never to make them feel more at home. Maybe to catch their eye, or to please them, but that... that was completely for Egwene's benefit, not him."

Lan laughed. "And then she married Morgase's boy."

Thom grinned. "Light, he's bonded to four different women. He hasn't done too bad for himself. But back when they were still thinking they'd end up together, they were so much more... innocent. More like Emond's Fielders than an Aes Sedai and the Dragon. After that, they seemed a bit more detached from their past. She became the Amyrlin Seat, and he did his damned job, the poor fool. But I'll always remember the blushing fool in the corner of a dark inn trying to work out the notes to a song he knew his girl liked. I'll remember the way he stayed up nights to make her happy.

"He could be a pain in the arse, but I'll be damned if it wasn't all for our sakes."

Lan nodded, raising his bottle.

"I agree," Thom said. "Let's drink."

"He died well," they said together.


End file.
